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“Hot Country Cold Winter”, a film directed by David Safarian, has won the Grand Prize Narrative Feature at the Socially Relevant Film Festival in New York, the Union of Cinematographers of Armenia told Panorama.am.

“Congratulations to our colleague, filmmaker, a member of the Directors Guild, David Safarian for winning the Grand Prix at the Socially Relevant International Film Festival in New York for the “Hot Country Cold Winter” film,” the union said. 

The members of the union also offered congratulations to Yana Druz for receiving the Best Actress award for her role in the film.

“Hot Country Cold Winter” follows a man and a woman suffering the circumstances of a total energy crisis. Their recollections, short narratives, imagination act as aids in understanding of the story, and in understanding that core human values are shared throughout the world. 

The scriptwriters of the film are David Safarian and Yana Druz. Its cast includes Yana Druz, Ashot Adamyan, Karen Dzhanibekyan, Hrachya Harutyunyan, Heghine Hovhannisyan, Harutyun Movsisyan and Vigen Stepanyan.

David Safarian was born in Yerevan in 1952. He graduated from Fine Arts and Drama Academy in Yerevan in 1975. From 1972 to 1978 he worked as an actor at the State TV Theatre in Yerevan, and as an assistant director and director at Armenian Documentary Film Studio.

He graduated from Film Academy - VGIK in Moscow in 1983. Since then he is a director at "Armenfilm" Studios. In 1991 Safarian had Special Screenings of his films in Cinematheque Francaise in Paris. Since 1991 he is a member of the General Assembly of Cinematheque Francaise. From 1995 to 2001 he shot series of short documentaries about Armenian Culture and History on German TV (ORB/RBB).

In 1996 he had a retrospective of films in Cinematheque Francaise at the 60th Anniversary of the Cinematheque in Paris and in 1999 One-Week Screenings of Selected Films in Berlin. In 2001 and 2002 he was a Guest-Professor at the Film and TV Department in the University of Kassel, Germany, and from 2003 to 2007 he worked as a professor co-heading the Film and TV Department at the same University. In 2002 David Safarian founded "Studio DS" - Film Production and Art Development Fund.